Paths
by the shine inside you
Summary: Heero and Duo go for a jog in the mornings.


**Paths**

_by_ the shine inside you

Warning: Mild hints of shonen-ai (hand-holding). Take it or leave it. My first fic - started around 4 a.m., and finished around 6:15, so my apologies in advance if a few things don't come together properly. (As of this writing I still haven't gone to sleep.)

Hoping this turned out as well as I'd have liked it to. Feedback, please. :)

Heero had awoken that morning to shuffling noises at the dorm doorway. He sat up cautiously and peered across the room, concerned that someone was sneaking in, but it didn't take him long to see that it was only Duo, tugging on a pair of still-tied sneakers. The braided boy was wearing drawstring sweatpants that might have been gray, and a loose sweater that was probably white - Heero couldn't tell. He sat up and glared at Duo in the darkness. "What are you doing?"

Duo started - "Heero!" - then cleared his throat and continued: "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you. I was just.. going out for a jog." He shifted a little nervously and glanced towards the door.

Heero looked at his clock, then back at Duo. "It's 3:57 a.m. You're going jogging?"

Duo squinched his nose a little, then shrugged. "Sure. Why not?"

Heero glared again and threw his covers back, climbing out of the bed. He rummaged in a drawer and pulled out a near-identical pair of sweatpants as Duo watched him silently. He pulled them on over his boxers and looked at Duo.

Duo blinked back at him. "You're coming?"

Heero shrugged. "Why not?"

As they jogged down the moonlit track, Heero contemplated Duo. Heero did not think it strange at all the Duo wanted to go jogging; what he thought strange was that Duo wanted to go jogging in the dead of night, when there was plenty of time while the sun was up to do so. At first he wondered if Duo was lying about his intentions, and he had intended to trip him up by offering to accompany him, but it seemed that jogging was, after all, Duo's plan that morning. He led the way, jogging purposefully until they reached a park, then ran with Heero down a path. They occasionally passed other joggers coming toward them, who would smile at Duo and Duo would smile back. Heero took this as an indication that he had done this before.

Soon they came to a spot with benches, and Duo stopped. Heero paused beside him.

Duo was looking into the trees, almost thoughtfully, a tiny smile on his face.

Heero stared at the trees likewise. "What is it you're looking at?"

But Duo just grinned at him and sat down. Heero sat, too, and looked out across the park. The jogging path they took was like a large, uneven loop, and was completely fenced in. Beyond the fence in front of him were a few flowers, some trees, but mostly an open field, then the track as it looped around; behind him there were almost a forest of trees. There was a small hint of light on the horizon, but stars were still in the sky above them. Heero looked up; he could see millions of them in the park, along with thousands of tiny, blinking satellites. He wondered what the sky might look like without them.

"There are fences."

Heero turned his head to the other boy and looked at him quizzically. "What?"

Duo had his head turned, too, but was looking into the trees again, and his arm was up and resting along the back of the bench. "Fences, all along this track. All throughout the park, they have the field and the trees fenced off."

Heero grunted. "They don't want us to leave the path."

Duo stared at him. "But don't you ever want to leave the path?"

"No," replied Heero, and nothing else was said. They returned to the dorm before sunrise.

For the next few days, Heero jogged with Duo. They didn't speak much, but the companionship was enough. Duo always stopped at the benches, and the two sat in silence for a while before jogging back to the dorm.

One morning, Heero woke up and Duo was already gone. Instead of going after him, Heero searched for any sign that Duo may have been gone on a mission, but all of Duo's things were still there, even his clothes. Only his sweatpants pants and sneakers were gone.

Heero wondered where Duo had gone, but Duo didn't show up to class and he wasn't back in the room when Heero returned; Heero resolved to look into it if Duo didn't return by the next day.

But the next morning, when Heero awoke early again out of habit, Duo was there getting ready to jog again. "Where were you yesterday?"

"Out."

Heero rolled his eyes and muttered "obviously" as he got up and pulled on his sweatpants.

Soon he and Duo were out of the building, together again, jogging silently down the sidewalk on the way to the part. But when they reached the park entrance, Duo stopped. He was looking at the trees again.

"Heero."

Heero stopped, too, and looked at Duo. "Hn?"

"Yesterday, I left that path. I went into the forest." He paused and looked up at the sky. "Don't you think it's beautiful here?"

Heero blinked. "What?"

"The sky. It's beautiful here on earth, isn't it?"

Heero shifted and pulled his eyes away from the braided boy in front of him to look at the stars above. He was greeted with millions of shining stars again, and thousands of tiny satellites winking at him in the night sky. "It is."

"There are a lot of things here on earth that the colonies don't have. Natural things. Caves, for example. Waterfalls. The colony engineers didn't see a use for natural structures like that. When they designed the colonies, they knew we didn't _need_ stars in the sky. They were all merely aesthetics. By the second generation of people, there would be no use for them."

"Duo, where are you going with this?"

"You were raised on a colony, right, Heero? Just like me - well, close, I guess." Duo laughed a little. Heero continued to stare. "You and I have been out in space, so we know what the stars look like. People on the earth know what stars look like. But the people on the colonies, Heero.. they have no idea."

Heero grunted again. "No one is making them stay on the colonies. They can travel to space any time they want and see the stars."

Duo shrugged. "Maybe. Or maybe they don't know about the stars."

"Everyone knows what stars are, Duo. There are books. There are pictures."

Duo plopped down on the ground by the edge of the sidewalk where the grass of the park began and patted the ground beside him, indicating for Heero to sit down as well. Once Heero had complied, Duo leaned back on the grass with his arms at his sides. "Go ahead and lie down, Heero."

Heero did so, but didn't stop glaring at Duo the whole time - he still didn't know where the idiot was going with this.

Duo turned his head to Heero so he was looking into his eyes and smiled. "Look at the sky."

He did.

Heero bit back a gasp at the scene before him. This was space as he had always and never seen it; these were the same stars and satellites he had seen every night, with one small exception: it was only the stars and satellites. Nothing else obscured his vision in the slightest; no trees around him, no windowframes, panel screens, or visors to look through - nothing but atmosphere between he and the outer space. It was... breathtaking.

He almost didn't notice when Duo's hand found his. "See, Heero. This is what I mean. You can't get this feeling from any photograph, or film, or ride on a spaceship. All those people, they think they know what the stars are like." Heero was staring at Duo, but the boy continued. "They haven't seen them like this. They won't leave the path."

Duo turned his head and smiled at Heero.

"Don't you ever want to leave the path?"

Heero did.


End file.
